Part XXXIII High Holding

“Marshal, 405, 407 checking in on your 340 for 50, low state base plus two.”

“405, Marshall, continue, call â€˜see me’ at 10 miles.”

“405″

Closing in on the ship, the wingman stays in a defensive combat spread formation, close enough to easily maintain sight of his lead, far enough away, to keep his own radar and visual scan moving. The airspace around the carrier is “uncontrolled,” and they are responsible for their own separation from the next launch in the cycle. Other flights are returning, either from their cap stations in country, or from training missions around the ship. He checks his fuel state again, double checks proper transfer from the external tanks – sometimes fuel gets trapped in one or the other externals, causing problems in useable fuel for recovery and potentially putting the aircraft out of limits for landing asymmetry.

Credo

"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me."

— John Paul Jones

"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature"

— George Bernard Shaw, Caesar and Cleopatra

"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."

— Friedrich Nietzsche

"A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty, are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancour, produces an indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate."

— Edmund Burke

"Μολὼν λαβέ"

— Leonidas

"Blogito Ergo Sum"

— Neptunus Lex